small lives with their duties and their
pleasures. Still shadowy, deeply hidden, the influence of the visionary
father lay. Even small Maizie awoke to tiny dreams, her literalness for
moments drowned out.

At school, Maizie and Suzanna were perhaps the least extravagantly
dressed little girls. Exquisitely clean, often quaintly adorned with
ribbons placed according to Suzanna's fancies, it still could be seen
that they came from an humble home.

Still, in their attitude there was toward their companions an
unconscious patronage, felt but hardly resented by the others, since
Suzanna and Maizie gave love and warmth besides.

And this unconscious feeling of superiority sprang from "belonging" to a
father who worked in his free hours that others out in the big world
might some day be glad he had lived! This idealism lent luster even to
his calling of weighing nails and selling washboards to the town of
Anchorville.

Jenny Bryson, in Suzanna's class, bragged of her father's financial
condition, and indeed she was a resplendent advertisement of his
success.

Suzanna listened interestedly. She gazed with admiration at the velvet
dress, the gold ring, and the pearl neck beads. She loved them all--the
smoothness of the velvet, the sparkle of the gold, the soft luster of
the pearls. But she felt no envy. She loved the adornments with her
imagination, not with desire. And though she could not say so to Jenny,
she rather pitied her for not having a father to whom a future
generation would bow in great gratitude.

Then too, as mother said, if you merely bought clothes, you lost the joy
of creating. Witness the ingenious way, following Suzanna's suggestion,
that mother had draped a lace curtain over a worn blue dress, and
behold, a result wonderful.

It was fun then to "make the best of your material," as mother again
said. Mother, who, when not too tired from many tasks, could paint rare
word pictures, build for eager little listeners castles of hope; build,
especially for Suzanna, colorful palaces with flaming jewels, crystal
lamps, scented draperies.

Joys sometimes come close together. Father's day, then Sunday with an
hour spent in the Massey pew with gentle Miss Massey, old John Massey's
only child, setting forth the lesson from the Bible, and then the
thrilling announcement by the Superintendent that a festival was to be
given by the primary teachers some time in August, the exact date to be
told later.

Miss Mass